Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to the field of computer based messaging and more particularly to buddy list management for messaging systems.
Description of the Related Art
The recent rapid development of the Internet has led to advanced modes of both asynchronous collaboration and synchronous, real-time collaboration able to fulfill the near real-time and real-time communicative requirements of the modern computing participant. Using the Internet as a backbone, individuals worldwide can converge in cyberspace to share ideas, documents and images in a manner not previously possible through conventional telephony and video conferencing. To facilitate collaboration over the Internet, a substantial collection of technologies and protocols have been assembled to effectively deliver audio, video and data over the single data communications medium of the Internet. These technologies include several human-to-human collaborative environments including electronic mail (e-mail) and instant messaging.
In both an e-mail system and an instant messaging system, commonly used addresses for collaborative partners are stored and maintained in an address book referred to as a “buddy list”. New entries generally are added to the buddy list in only one of two ways: manually, or in response to receiving an e-mail or a chat request from another party. In either circumstance, the composition and addressing of a new e-mail message, or the establishment of a subsequent conversation in an instant messaging session with the same collaborator can be as simple as locating and selecting the address of the collaborator in the buddy list.
The widespread popularity of asynchronous and synchronous communications in lieu of telephonic communications, however, has led to the bloating of the venerable buddy list. Specifically, the traditional buddy list is nothing more than a two level and sometimes three level tree in which different contacts are listed (usually alphabetically) and oftentimes grouped according to classification such as the “North Office” and the “South Office” or the “ABC Team” or “Human Resources”. When the number of contacts or groups in the buddy list exceeds just a dozen or so names, the tree can become lengthy while remaining shallow. To locate a contact of interest, then requires substantial scrolling and the desired contact can be lost in a sea of contacts in the buddy list.
End users attempt to maintain the utility of the buddy list by “pruning” the buddy list from time to time. Pruning a buddy list generally requires the end user to consider every reference in a buddy list to determine whether interactions past, present or future, warrant the maintenance of a contact in the buddy list. As one can imagine, pruning a buddy list of hundreds of contacts can be both time consuming and inaccurate. In many cases, contacts can be removed from the buddy list unintentionally while other contacts will needlessly remain in the buddy list.